


The Bride Trilogy: The Autumn Bride

by lexwing



Series: The Bride Trilogy [2]
Category: Once Upon a Time (TV)
Genre: F/M, Family, Flashbacks, Future Fic, Gen, Marriage, Marriage Proposal, Romance, War
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-12-31
Updated: 2014-03-01
Packaged: 2018-01-06 22:51:54
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 4
Words: 19,836
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1112458
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/lexwing/pseuds/lexwing
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Rumple tells his teenage daughter the tale of the Autumn Bride.  Flashback fic.  Rumple returns, and he and Belle deal with the fallout post season 3 midseason finale.  But can they finally make it to the altar?</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> A safe and Happy New Year to you all!  
> As always, I own nothing.

The Autumn Bride              

 

    _Once upon a time, there was a man who had made a series of very bad decisions._

_He’d had his reasons, of course, as all men do—some of them very good reasons._

_But they were bad decisions nonetheless._

_Then, at long last, he’d made one very good one._

_When all else had seemed lost, he’d sacrificed himself._

_He hadn’t wanted to die, not now when he should have been at his very happiest and he at last had had everything he’d ever wanted._

_He hadn’t done it because of a prophecy, although of course this being a fairy tale there_ was _a prophecy._

_He’d done it to save those he loved._

_And that was the only reason—the only possible reason, he reflected in the months and years afterwards—that he’d been able to open his eyes and find himself face down in the grass, clad in homespun and barely able to walk on a damaged leg._

_He had died, but he had not died.  Or to be more, precise, only one part of him had died.  The other, the human part of him, had been allowed to continue living._

_Therein lay the rub.  For he was human now, memory blessedly intact, but he had no magic to speak of.  No matter how hard he concentrated he was not able to conjure more than the barest wisps of useless smoke._

_And this world was at war.  The roads he traveled on were full of refugees fleeing enemy armies.  More days than not he saw smoke rising from villages that had been or were being destroyed._

_Without magic there was nothing he could do to help them._

  _But he was not deterred.  On his hobbled leg he set out to find those he loved._

_Only to fall into the hands of a Dark Fairy._

_He didn’t know much about her, save that she had come from another realm and had invaded his homeland from the West._

_She knew when he had fallen back into this world, and had sent her men to track him down.  Surely, the Dark Fairy had told him, the Dark One would be able to tell her about this land, about the enemies who even now were gathering forces to oppose her, about their strengths and weaknesses._

_No matter how many times he had tried to tell her that he was nothing more than a man now, she would not listen.  Even when it became clear to her that he possessed no more magic she was still certain he might be useful, if she just pressed him hard enough._

_He tried to tell his torturers that he was only human now, but to no avail.  He recalled hearing similar pleas when he had been the one inflicting the torture.  Had he ever listened?  He had not._

_Days bled into weeks, and the weeks into months.  His wound had not healed properly, and was now joined by dozens of other wounds.  He was given only bread and water, and many days he was given nothing at all.  He grew weak and feverish.  His all-too-human body, he knew, was starting to fail him._

_His friends and family did not know he was alive, and now they would not know he had died._

_That last was what caused him finally to despair._

_And so he despaired, and waited for death.  This one, he knew, would be permanent._

_But fate again had other plans._

_One night, when the air was hot and still and seemed even hotter inside his cell due to his fever, there was a commotion in the hall outside.  He couldn’t be sure but he thought he heard the distinctive sounds of steel clashing on steel.  A fight?  A duel?  He was too weak to care._

_The door to his cell had scraped open, and for the first time in months someone new had entered._

   _He had not recognized the crimson leather doublet, the brown trousers or the sharp sword in her hand.  He had not recognized the long brown hair bound tightly into a braid.  But he had recognized the bright blue eyes, so bright it hurt him to look into them.  And when this person took ahold of the front of his filthy tunic and shook him he had recognized the voice._

_“That makes three times you’ve left me!  Three times!  There isn’t going to be a fourth, do you understand me?”_

_She might have been yelling, or she might have been whispering; he had been too dizzy to know the difference.  But he had recognized that she was crying, because the blessedly cool tears had splashed down onto his face, washing away some of the dirt and blood._

_He had smiled through cracked lips._

_“I do, Belle.  I understand.  Never again.”_

_And then the man had blacked out._

* * *

 

   “Papa?  Papa, you need to wake up now.  We need to get some water in you, ok?”

   Baelfire.

   From wherever he’d been drifting, dreaming, Rumple forced himself to focus on that voice. He opened his eyes and squinted hard as a shape above him formed itself into a face.

   Not Baelfire, the boy who had been lost, but Neal, the man who had been found, was sitting next to him, supporting his head and pressing a glass of cool water to his lips.  Rumple took a swallow, and then another one.  His stomach growled in protest.

   “What…”  He managed to croak.

   “Take it easy,” Neal told him.  He gently eased Rumple’s head back against the pillow.  A very clean, very soft pillow, Rumple now noticed.  Now that his eyes were working again he glanced around them.  It was dark, but in the feeble lantern light he could tell they were in some sort of tent.  It seemed spacious, and the cot on which he lay felt blessedly comfortable after the floor of his prison cell.

   Neal must have read all the questions in his eyes because he chuckled.

   “I know you have a lot of questions, and believe me, I have some for you.  Right now you need to rest.  You’ve had a high fever; you’ve been completely out of it for days.  We weren’t sure if…”  Neal’s voice cracked a bit.  “But the fever’s broken now.  You’re through the worst of it.  You’re going to be fine.”

   Rumple was exhausted, but he forced his mouth to form one last, important word. 

   “Belle?”  He asked in a harsh whisper.

   “She’s right there, Papa.”  Neal smiled and pointed over Rumple, to a second bunk across the room he hadn’t noticed before.  Belle was on her side, breathing steadily in the darkness.  “She’s been up taking care of you for days and she’s exhausted.  And though she’ll probably kick my ass later I’m not about to wake her up for you, so don’t ask.  You’ll see her soon.”

   The man smiled sleepily at his son, and nodded before slipping back down into darkness again. 

 

* * *

 

   When next he opened his eyes the sun was shining through the tent flap.  Outside he could hear the sounds of many feet, and the hooves of horses, and the clang of metal on metal.

   They were sounds he had not heard in centuries, but he recognized them instantly.  He was in some sort of army camp.  He had to be.

   Belle and Neal were seated at a little table, eating breakfast. 

   “…should have woken me up, Neal!  You promised!”

   “I lied.  I do that sometimes,” Neal told her with a grin as he drank something from a cup.

   “Don’t…scold the boy,” Rumple managed to say aloud.  His voice sounded odd to his ears, like a rusty hinge.  “Trying to…help.”

   “Rumple, you’re awake!”  In a moment Belle was on him, feeling his forehead, his chest.  “How do you feel?  Are you hungry?  You must be famished!  We haven’t been able to get anything down you but water and some broth in days.”

   He shook his head.  The very idea of ingesting any solid food made his stomach roil in rebellion.

   He ran a shaky hand over his face.  He was clean now, he suddenly realized.  His filthy garments were gone.  They had been replaced by a soft tunic and leggings.  He still needed a haircut but it felt like the mats and knots had been combed out of his hair.  Someone--Neal, most likely--had given him a shave.

   He tried to push himself up against the pillows to better see Belle and his son.  He found it surprisingly difficult to do so.  Not only did his arms seem incredibly weak, but a weight on his leg seemed to be limiting his movement.  Rumple wiggled about a bit under the covers and quickly discovered even that bit of movement caused him to ache all over. 

  “You’ve got to move slowly, Papa.  You’re one big mess of bandages and bruises, and the healers have got your leg in a splint.”

   Neal gingerly helped him sit up.  Belle hastily stuffed another pillow behind his back so he wouldn’t fall over.

   Rumple pulled back the blanket to survey the damage.  His right leg was indeed in a splint.  Two stout pieces of wood ran on either side of it from mid-thigh to ankle, bound tightly together with straps of fabric.  He moved his toes, relieved that he could still feel them, but further motion was impossible.

   “The Dark Fairy’s soldiers had broken it again,” Neal told him, his face paling a bit as he spoke.  “And it was broken in a second place when we fell through the portal that got us back here.  The healers had no choice but to reset it and hope for the best.”

   Rumple didn’t see any point in dwelling on how his leg had been re-broken.  Of course it had not taken his torturers long to discover the old injury and to use it to cause him all kinds of new pain.  He was more interested in the other part of Neal’s statement.

     "We went through...another...portal?"

   “Only because our original escape route was blocked by more soldiers,” Belle explained. 

   “Where…?”

   Belle, bless her, instantly understood where his thoughts were going.

   “Where did we get one?  It turns out a tiny amount of fairy dust, mixed with juice from a blue poppy, will produce a weak portal, one just strong enough to move you from one place to another inside the same realm.  Tinkerbelle’s original recipe. It’s really been coming in handy lately.  Don’t you remember any of this, Rumple?”

   “Everything’s…fuzzy.  Like a dream.”  He smiled.  “When I saw you…thought I was dreaming.”

   “That was the fever,” she countered. 

   Rumple closed his eyes and tried to concentrate.  Belle had broken into his cell, and then…yelling.  Fighting.  Being supported by two sets of arms as they half-carried him down a long hallway…

   “You were there, too,” he told his son.

   “Of course I was.  And a few others.  You don’t think we’d let Belle try something that insane by herself, do you?”  Neal said proudly.

   Rumple reached out and took Neal’s hand, and Belle’s, in his own.  “Shouldn’t have...risked it.  But thank you.”

   “You would have done the same for either of us.” Neal nodded. 

    Belle squeezed his hand.  “It was only pure chance we found you, Rumple.  A few weeks ago Charming’s men captured one of the Dark Fairy’s officers. The man tried to bargain for his freedom.  At first it seemed he didn’t have any intelligence of any value.  Finally he told Charming that he’d heard the Fairy had a sorcerer from the world without magic imprisoned in Malificent’s old Grey Fortress.”

  “Might have been…lying,” Rumple said with a wheezy chuckle.

   “He might have been,” Neal agreed. “But then again his life was on the line.  Charming had to assume there was a good chance he was telling the truth.”

   “Rumple, everyone was so certain you were dead.”  Belle’s eyes grew serious.

   “But not…you,” he said with a smile.

   “Well, no, not me.  I always thought there might be the tinniest of chances…”  Her eyes were filling with tears.  But she blinked them back and sat up straighter on the edge of the cot.  “Rumple, it’s been months and months. Wasn’t there at least some way you could have magically gotten word to us, let us know you were alive?”

   He let go of his son’s hand long enough to wiggle his fingers in the air. 

   Neal instinctively leaned backwards.  But nothing happened.

   “No.  See?  Magic is…gone.  Killed it when I killed…Pan and…myself.”

   Neal slumped down a bit.  “I’m so sorry, Papa.  I know how much your magic meant to you.”

   Rumple took his hand again.  “Doesn’t mean more to me than…the two of you.  Never…did.”

   Belle stroked his hair away from his face.  “It’s ok, Rumple.  We’ll figure this out, like we have everything else.  Now, I’m going to make us some tea with honey.  You need nourishment, and it will make your throat feel better, too.” 

   She slid away, and he very reluctantly let go of her hand.  Belle began to bustle about the tent, picking up a kettle from over a small coal fire and filling mugs with tea leaves.

   Neal continued to stare at his hands.  Even in his weakened state Rumple could see there was something more troubling his son.

   “Neal?”’ He asked slowly, not certain he wanted to hear the answer.  “Where’s…Henry? And Emma?”

   Before Neal could answer shadows darkened the entry way.

   “May we come in?”  A masculine voice asked.

   “He’s awake.  So, yes, you may,” Belle replied as she poured steaming water into cups, quickly adding two more for their visitors. 

   The man who entered was tall and strongly-built.  His hair was a sandy brown and his clothes were in the shades of the forest, soft greens and tans.  He had a sword hooked to his waist and a bow and quiver slung down his back.  He seemed vaguely familiar to Rumple, but he couldn’t immediately place him.

   The woman Rumple was certain he had never seen before.  She was tall, her brown hair bound back away from her face.  Her clothes were strange, draping over her torso but leaving most of her arms bare.  Her skirt was split in the middle, revealing boots and trousers underneath.  Strange metal bands made of gold encircled her wrists and upper arms.  She, too, wore a sword as well as a dagger in her golden belt. 

   But it was her blue eyes that captured Rumple’s attention.  They were very like Belle’s, almost exactly the same shade.  But where Belle’s eyes were always warm and smiling this woman’s were cool, wary, and appraising.

   “Hail and well met, Rumplestiltskin,” the man said to him.  “It is many years now since we last saw one another.” 

   “You remember Robin Hood, Rumple.” Belle handed him a mug laced with a generous dollop of honey.

   “Robin…”  He paused to take a careful sip of hot tea.  “Oh, yes.  The thief.”

   Robin just laughed.  “Nor have I forgotten you, Dark One.”

   “Robin’s actually a nice guy,” Neal offered.  He accepted the mug Belle offered him and took a deep swallow.  “He’s helped us out more times than I can count.  Including breaking you out of that castle.”

    Rumple blinked.  “I tried…to kill him.”  He cleared his throat, trying to speak more coherently.  “I would have killed him, if Belle hadn’t been there.  Why would he help rescue me?”

   “Well, like Neal said, he’s a nice man,” Belle said.  “Tea, Robin?”

   “No, thank you, Lady Belle.  More importantly,” Robin explained to Rumple, “I owed your fair lady a debt, for freeing me from you in the first place.  When I found out she was going to try and rescue you, I could but offer her my humble assistance.”   

   Rumple felt oddly pleased to hear Belle called “his” lady.   

   He squinted at the strange woman who was sipping her tea in silence.  “And who are you?”  

   Belle and Neal exchanged a long look.

   “This is Melanippe,” Belle said brightly.  “She helped rescue you, too.  She’s commander of this army.”

   “She’s a hell of a fighter,” Neal added.

   Rumple thought about this for a long moment, the pieces finally starting to fall into place in his sluggish brain.  The tent; the sounds of boots and of horses; an army commanded by a woman; the fact that there was a war going on but that he’d been able to convalesce for days in safety…He squeezed his eyes shut.

   “Neal, please tell me that we’re not in an Amazon camp.”

   "Um, I'm afraid I can't do that.  Because we are." 

   Rumple frowned.  In his very long life he’d traveled the length and breadth of their world, and of many others besides.  But even he had only ever seen the legendary female warriors from a distance. 

   The Amazons cared only for their own kind.  They spent most of their time shut up behind the high walls surrounding their lands in Scythia.  And when they did emerge it was usually to war against the men in the villages along their southern borders. 

     The Dark One had never been particularly interested in them.  Amazons didn’t negotiate, and they didn’t make deals.  They were also hostile, often murderously so, to males in general.  All rumors to the contrary, the Dark One had been very much a man.  Thus Rumplestiltskin had decided long ago that there was nothing to be gained by approaching them and everything to lose.

   So to now be told he was being nursed back to health in an Amazon camp, and for his son and Robin Hood to be there as well, confounded him, to say the least.

   “The Amazons have never fought for or with anyone else in the Enchanted Forest before,” he said bluntly.  “Not even during the First Ogre Wars.  And, speaking as someone who was there, we certainly could have used your help then, dearie.  So why are you here now?”  He asked the woman. 

   “This is not just your world,” she told him in a low voice.  “And the circumstances have changed.”

   He narrowed his eyes.  He might be fully human again.  But he still had the insights and instincts he’d gained over almost three hundred years of life.  It was obvious there was far more to the story than he was being told.

   Belle squeezed his arm.  “We can talk more about this another time.  Right now Rumple needs to rest.”

   “Of course,” Melanippe said smoothly.

   “One more thing,” the former sorcerer added quickly.  “This is important.  And this is something all of you need to hear.  The Dark Fairy and her men are interested in you.  All of you.  She kept demanding information about who was moving against her, what their motivations were.” 

   He looked Neal in the eye.  “I never told her anything.”

   “Of course you didn’t,” Neal responded.  “No one would believe you did.”

   “I’ve no doubt she has other sources of information.  She’s a powerful sorceress, and a cruel one.  But she’s smart, too.  That’s a terrible combination."

   "We know," Robin said with a sigh.  We know. "

* * *

 

    After the long talks he’d had that morning Rumple slept most of the rest of the day away.  One of the Amazonian healers, a grim-faced woman of middle age, checked on him in the early evening.  She poked and prodded at him, changed his bandages, and then ordered him to stay in bed for at least another week.  When he’d protested this she’d immediately silenced him with a glare.

   “Unless you want to spend the rest of your life limping worse than you did before, you’ll heed my advice.  The less weight you put on that limb the better chance the bones will have to knit together properly this time.”

   “He’ll listen,” Belle told her as she filled a bowl with soup for Rumple’s supper.  “He’s stubborn, but he’s not foolish.” 

   “All men are foolish,” the healer grumbled as she gathered her things and left.  “Why I have to waste my time on one of them…”

   Belle sighed after she was gone.  “Ignore that last bit she said, Rumple.”

   “It isn’t as if I want to go dashing off into battle, Belle,” he explained.  “Right now I doubt I could walk across this tent without falling down.  But a week lying here, staring at the ceiling?  I’ll go mad.”

   “No, you won’t.  We’ll come up with something to keep you occupied.”  She pulled over a chair and sat next to his cot.

   He smiled at her.  “Going to keep me company while I eat?”

   “Of course.  In fact I doubt very much I’ll be letting you out of my sight any time soon.”

   “You’re too good for me, Belle.  You always were, and you still are.”

   “Oh, don’t start that again.”

   “I still can’t believe the Amazons tolerate my being here,” he said between spoonfuls of the hot broth.  “Things can’t possibly have changed that much while I was gone.”

   “They haven’t.”  Belle’s smile was wry.  “The female soldiers do grumble and complain.  And it’s not as if Melanippe’s thrown open the camp to men.  So far the only ones she’s permitted in have been you, Neal, and Robin.  Oh, and Roland, but he doesn’t really count.”

   “Roland?”

   “Robin’s little boy.  He’s only four.”  Belle laughed.  “He’s the sweetest little thing.  His late mother, Marion, was the pregnant woman you and I saw Robin save in the woods.  Remember?  Robin adores the child.  But he’ll be sending Roland south for his own safety soon.”

   “It’s odd, Rumple,” she continued. “The Amazons seem to find the presence of men, any men, offensive to their culture and to their way of life.  No one’s been able to give me a very good explanation of why they feel that way, or how it all started.  But Melanippe commands this army.  On top of that she’s one of Queen Pentheselia’s sisters.  So her people do what she says.”

   “And why does the sister of the Amazon queen tolerate our being here?  I got the feeling this morning she was going to explain that, but she did not.”

   Belle’s blue gaze was steady. 

   “I don’t know how much to tell you without overwhelming you when you need to focus on resting and healing, Rumple.  But,” she sighed, “you’ve probably gathered that things are not going very well in our fight against the Dark Fairy.”

   “I’ve gotten that impression.”

   “We just weren’t prepared at all, Rumple.  First the fight with Pan, and the Curse coming back, and then we lost you, or thought we’d lost you, and then we lost Henry and Emma…”

   Rumple choked on his soup.  “’Lost’ them?  What…?!”

   “No, no, I’m sorry, ‘lost’ isn’t the right word, darling.  They’re still alive, but they’re back in the world without magic.  And they don’t remember any of us, not anymore.”

   Quickly Belle filled Rumple in on the terrible compromise that had been made in order to make sure Henry would not be left behind alone to fend for himself.

   “It broke all of our hearts to do it—Regina’s most of all, I think.  But there wasn’t any other way.”

   He pushed aside his soup bowl.  He’d lost his appetite. 

   “I killed myself to stop Pan from killing all of you,” he said quietly.  “I knew I couldn’t stop the Curse.  But I could stop _him_.  I thought that at least this way you’d all be alive and together…But you’re not all together.  You’re scattered to the four winds, and Neal’s lost his son.”

   “We will all be together again.”  Belle rose and sat on the edge of his bed.  “You have to believe that, Rumple.  I do.”

   “Do you?”  He laughed bitterly.

   “Yes, I do,” Belle said staunchly.  “Rumple, I saw you disappear into nothing with my own eyes.  Yet I still hoped, even when there was no reason to do so.  And at last I got you back.  If that’s not a reason to hold on to hope I don’t know what is.”

   She regarded him steadily for a long moment.  “Rumplestiltskin, do you remember the first thing I said to you when I found you in that cell?”

   He closed his eyes for a moment.  “Something about…losing me three times.  And not losing me a fourth.”

   “I meant that, Rumple.  The first time you pushed me away because you thought I was going to steal your magic.  The second and third times you parted from me because you were being noble, and because you were trying to help others.” 

     Her eyes blazed with tearful indignation.  “All that ends today.  Here and now.  You are never, _ever_ going to leave me behind again.  I won’t stand for it.”

   She sniffled a bit.  “You don’t know what it was like.  Everyone tiptoed around me for months, like I was made of glass and would break any second.  Even Neal.  Like I would do myself in if they didn’t watch me every second of every day.  They didn’t even want me saying your name.”

   “They were trying to protect you, sweetheart.  They love you.”

   “I didn’t need protecting!” She declared.  “I told you once I wanted adventure. Well, I've been having nothing but adventures for months now.  And it’s all seemed so terribly empty.  I needed something to believe in, something to fight for.  And now I’ve got it.  _You’re_ what I believe in, Rumplestiltskin, and our future is what I’m going to be fighting for.”

   Rumple was so shocked by this, and so deeply touched by this beautiful woman’s unshakeable love for him, that for a long moment he couldn’t speak at all.  Finally he was able to swallow down the lump in his throat.

   “I have less to offer you now than I ever did, Belle.” 

     She opened her mouth to protest, and he quickly held up a hand. 

     “Please, let me finish.  It was hard enough to believe you could love me when I was a powerful sorcerer.  Now, as far as I can tell, I’m just an ordinary man again.  I’m nearly three hundred years old; my leg’s broken, again; we’re in the middle of a war; and my hands are empty.  I have nothing to my name just now.  Not even my spinning wheel.  You’re young, and beautiful, smart and brave…and strong, Belle, so very, very strong.  You’re stronger than I ever was, or will ever be.”

   He smiled crookedly. “But, if you’ll have me, poor, empty-handed soul that I am, you would make me the happiest man in this or any other realm.”

   Her response was a kiss so enthusiastic it made him dizzy.  In that moment he would have braved any Amazon’s wrath if he could have flung off the splint and bandages and embraced her properly.  But she pulled away before he could act on that thought.

   Instead she curled up next to him on the narrow bunk and stroked his hair.  “That better have been a proposal,” she whispered in his ear.  “Because I’m taking it as one.”

   “That was definitely a proposal,” he whispered back.  “In fact, back in the shop, before everything went sideways, I was about to start working on your engagement ring.”

   “You were?”  She smiled shyly.  “What was it going to look like?”

   “I was going to weave it out of gold I had spun.  Braided, like your hair is now.  And then I was going to set a sapphire in the middle of it.  I knew just the one I was going to use.  It came from an Agrabaian sultan and was exactly the color of your eyes.”

   Belle sighed rapturously.  “It sounds beautiful.”

   “I’m so sorry I’m not going to be able to make it for you now, Belle.  You deserve it.  You deserve a thousand rings.  A million of them.”   

   His new fiancée just giggled.  “No one in this land wears engagement rings anyway.  Or wedding rings, for that matter.” 

   She kissed the tip of his nose. 

   “Oh, and one other thing, my love.  Do please make an effort to get along with Melanippe.  She’s not like the others.  She’s actually quite reasonable.  Even kind, in her own way.”

   He smoothed her hair, wishing again desperately that he was in any kind of condition to make love to her.  But he wasn’t, and so he had to settle for another kiss.

   “Anything for you, dearie.  Anything.  But I don’t know why she matters to you.”

   She tipped his head back so she could look him in the eyes, bright blue to soft brown ones.

   “She’s my aunt.  So I’m afraid from now on she’ll have to matter to you, too, Rumple.”

 

 


	2. Ch. 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Belle has a tale to tell, Regina struggles with being a team player, and Rumple joins the war effort.

 

* * *

 

   He and Belle stayed up together talking late into the night.  Belle told him the tale of how, out of sheer desperation, she and her friend Mulan had gone to the Amazons to ask for their help against the Dark Fairy.

   Belle had once told him the story of her meeting with the eastern warrior, and of how they had freed Prince Phillip from a curse.  Even so he couldn’t believe that such a brave fighter would be so foolish as to approach Scythia uninvited. 

    “Mulan is one of the very few people who had met Amazons before, spoken with them,” Belle explained.  “They were a people of great honor, she said.  Anyway, she felt it was at least worth a try.”

   “You might have been killed,” he told her, his stomach in knots just thinking about the risk they had taken.

   “The Dark Fairy had captured Mary-Margaret and the Blue Fairy,” Belle offered.  “Our army was no match for hers.  What choice did we really have?”

   It was while in Scythia that Belle had what at first had seemed like a chance encounter with a soothsayer named Arachne. 

   Rumple had heard of Arachne.  She was rumored to be an extremely powerful sorceress, but one cursed by the gods to forever spin out the fates of mankind from her wheel.  She was ancient, and, by all accounts, entirely mad.

   “It wasn’t what the old woman said, so much as it was what she didn’t say,” Belle tried to explain to him.  “I mean, there I was, standing in the palace garden, trying to figure out how to keep the Queen from sending us away empty-handed, which I was sure she was about to do.  And this strange little woman comes up to me and starts talking about how the only duty that Amazons regard more highly than their duty to their people is their duty to blood.  She kept saying that over and over.  Blood.  Blood. 

   And then she started telling me about the five daughters of Queen Otrera: how the eldest, Pentheselia, now sat on the throne and that the youngest, Melanippe, commanded her armies.  Two others had been assassinated along with their mother years before.  But there was another daughter, one who had left Scythia and fallen in love with and married a man.  That’s the very first and very oldest rule the Amazons have, Rumple: they may never marry.  To do so earns you eternal banishment.  You can never cross through the gates of Scythia again.”

   “Seems a bit harsh,” he reasoned.  “But how did you connect any of this back to your own mother?  You always told me you barely knew her.”

   “I didn’t, at first.  Arachne told me that the Amazons believed that gods had punished the sister who had been banished by letting her die in childbirth.  She died bearing a son, who also died.  But Arachne said she didn’t believe that version of events, because the sister had born a living daughter a few years before she died.  And Amazons believe daughters to be the greatest of all blessings.”

   She paused for a moment before continuing. 

   “Just out of curiosity I asked what the name of the banished sister had been.  The old woman told me that Pentheselia had forbidden anyone in the land from ever speaking her name again.  She was the one who’d banished her sister in the first place, you see.”

   “This Amazonian queen sounds like quite the piece of work.”

   “Regina looks cuddly by comparison,” Belle said tartly.  “Where was I?”

   “The name.”

   “Yes.  It was the strangest thing, Rumple.  Suddenly I found myself thinking about what you had always said, about names being power.  I was sure that’s why the Queen forbade anyone to speak of her sister: it was a way to keep taking away her power, even after she was dead.  So, on a whim, I asked if the sister had ever been known by any other names, names that Arachne could speak without breaking the law.  And the old woman told me that, outside of Scythia, the name the sister had used, the one she was buried with, was Helena.”

   “Your mother’s name.”

   “Yes.”

   Rumple thought about this for a moment.  “It could have all been an enormous coincidence.”

   She gazed at him.  “There are no coincidences, Rumple.  Chance, yes; luck, yes; but not coincidences.  That’s something else you told me once.”

   “It is flattering to know you’ve been paying such close attention to my words all these years, dearie,” he laughed.

   “Don’t think it was easy for me to believe it wasn't a coincidence, at first.  It seemed far too outlandish.  I’ve never felt even slightly Amazon-ish, if that’s a word.  In fact most of my life has been about forcing myself to be brave.”

   “Nonsense.  You are brave, Belle.  You’re every bit as brave as Emma or Snow or anyone else to whom you’d care to compare yourself.”

   “I wrestled with it all night.  Was I really willing to risk my life, and Mulan’s, on something a crazy old women told me?  But the more I thought about it, the more it made the oddest kind of sense.  It explained why my father was never willing to speak about my mother after she and my baby brother died.  Why she seemingly had no kin, no homeland, no place I could visit to feel closer to her.  He would never even tell me much about how they had met, save that it was on the road between Penryth and Avalon.  It even explains why he was so determined to keep me from making my own decisions, or having any sort of adventures of any kind.  Maybe he saw that streak of my mother’s character in me, and didn’t want me to have a similarly unhappy fate.” 

   “By morning, I had decided.  It was a gamble, but I had to take it.  So when Mulan and I were called to stand before the Queen again.  She announced that she’d considered our petition and that the problems of the outside world were not her concern.  I stepped forward and said I had a claim of blood that I expected to have honored.”

   Belle shivered a bit at the memory.  “You should have seen her face, Rumple.  She _knew_.  She’d known all along who I was.  That’s why she was trying to get rid of us so quickly.  This was in front of her whole court, mind.”

   “Very dramatic.  Then what happened?”

   “Everyone was gasping and whispering, and the Queen was clearly furious.  But she didn’t try to deny it.  Instead she lashed out at Melanippe, who was standing nearby.  She accused her sister of treason, of betraying her.  Well, of course Melanippe had not said more than three words to me the whole time I was there, and I said so.  The Queen then had her guards grab me by the arms and demanded to know who had told me.”

   “And Arachne came forward.”

   “Yes, she did, bless her.  This raggedly little figure came hobbling into this beautiful chamber.  People got right out of her way.  She announced that all she had done was drop some breadcrumbs, and that she couldn’t help it if a little bird followed them.  It was done, she said, as the thread she had spun many years ago had said it should be done.” 

   Belle paused to look at him again.  “Do you think she might have been telling the truth? That it’s really possible she knew all this before I'd even been born?”

   “That’s the funny thing about seeing the future.  It never plays out the way you expect it will.  Maybe the ultimate destination is known, but how you arrive there is always going to be a surprise.”  He smiled slightly.  “Or maybe Arachne’s just much, much better at soothsaying than I ever was.”

   “The Amazons certainly believe in her, I can tell you that much.  The whole place was in an uproar.  I knew the Queen wanted me out of there.  So I told her I would leave just as soon as she had fulfilled my request for soldiers and arms, and that she would never see me again after that.  What could she do then but comply?  She didn’t give me the whole army, of course.  Just four centuriae, but still: that’s almost four hundred people!  Melanippe came forward and demanded that she remain in command of them.  So that’s how we all got here.” 

   She smiled shyly.  “Melanippe told me later she’d known all along who I was, too.  She couldn’t say anything, of course.  But she says she knew me at once because I look just like my mother.”

   “There was something familiar about Melanippe when you introduced us this morning,” Rumple admitted.  “It was the eyes.  You have very similar eyes.”

   Belle laughed.  “A family trait, apparently.”  She rested her head on his shoulder, clearly tired from telling such a long tale.”

   “Belle?”  He finally asked.

   “Hmm?”  She said sleepily. 

   “Did you ever find out what your mother’s real name was?”

   Belle nodded. 

   “Hippolyta.  Her name was Hippolyta.  But I have to say that, all things considered, I prefer the name ‘Helena.’”

* * *

 

   When he awoke the next morning Belle was still curled up next to him.  They’d shared a bed before, of course, back in Storybrooke.  But they’d never done so in this world.

   It didn’t even matter to him that they were both still dressed, and that nothing had happened between them the night before.  He was still the happiest of men.

   Or at least he was until he heard a sharp voice outside the tent.

   “Where is he?  I demand to see him this instant!”

   Before he’d even had a chance to sit up Regina marched through the closed tent flap and skidded to a halt at the sight of he and Belle side by side on the cot.

   “Oh, for god’s sake!”  She cried, covering her eyes.

   The noise woke Belle up, and she climbed off the bed.  “There’s no need to make a scene,” she told Regina sleepily.  “I still have all my clothes on.  See?  Oh, and we’re officially engaged now, so there’s that.”

   Regina rolled her eyes.  “How quaint,” she sneered.  She was back in head-to-toe black, with a high lace collar that made her look a bit like a deranged nun.

   “Perhaps you should knock next time, dearie,” Rumple suggested.  It hurt, but he successfully wrestled himself into a sitting position.

   “Knock? On what?  The canvas?”  The former queen came to stand over him.  “You’re supposed to be dead!  And where the hell have you been?”

   “Which question would you like answered first: why I’m not dead, or where I’ve been?”  He replied.  It felt good to spar with Regina again.

   Neal ducked into the tent.  “Sorry, you two,” he told Rumple and Belle.  “I tried to intercept her but I wasn’t fast enough.”

   “It’s fine, Neal,” Belle said.  “Your father was awake anyway.  And guess what?  We’re engaged!”

   “You are?”  Neal looked from his father to Belle and back again.

   “We are,” Rumple confirmed.  “What do you say to that?”

   “I say it’s about damn time!”  Neal hugged Belle and then bent down give his father’s shoulder a rough squeeze. 

   “Going to try to make an honest man out of him, huh, Belle?”  Neal laughed.

   “She already did, long ago,” Rumple countered.

   “Ahem!”  Regina interrupted sharply.  “We were in the middle of something here.  Oh, look, let me just check for myself.”

   Before anyone could stop her Regina waved her hand and a thin coil of magic spread out from her and enveloped Rumple.

   “Hey!”  Neal yelped in protest.

   “She’s not hurting me, son,” Rumple told him.  “Relax.”

   Regina look genuinely puzzled as she dropped her hand and the magic dissipated.  “That’s…odd."

   “What, odder than dying but not dying?”  Rumple needled her.

   “Your magic’s gone,” she replied.

   “Yes, I had figured that out for myself, thank you.”

   “How can it be…gone, just like that?  Do something,” she commanded.

   “Like what?”

   “I don’t know, a simple summoning spell, a charm, whatever.”

   He sighed.  “Fine.  But it’s pointless, I’m telling you.”  He opened his palm in the gesture one would usually use to summon something.

   Nothing happened.

   “Oh, come on, you weren’t even trying that time!”  Regina protested.  “You have to mean it, Rumple.  You, of all people, know that.  Try again.”

   “Regina,” Belle said quietly.

   This time Rumple put all of his effort into it, as he had during those long, dark days trapped in the Grey Fortress.  At last he was able to produce the thinnest wisp of silvery smoke.  It lingered on his palm for a second or two, and then was gone.

   Somehow this seemed to calm Regina a bit. 

   “Better.  So it’s not completely gone, then.”

   Rumple shrugged.  “Might as well be.”

   “How can you not be angry about his?”

   “Because I had several long months in a prison cell to get used to the idea,” he retorted.  “Why do you care?”

   “Because without magic you’re completely _useless_ to me!”  She cried.  “The Blue Fairy’s been captured; no one knows where the hell Malificent is; Emma’s in another realm...I need another sorcerer, Rumplestiltskin!  I can’t do this by myself!  So I hear you’re actually alive and I rush over here and what are you doing?  Just _lying_ there,” she gestured in disgust, “being entirely ordinary!”    

   “The man’s got a broken leg and a stab wound that’s still not fully healed, Regina!  Back the hell off,” Neal demanded.

   “Or you’ll do what, Baelfire?”  She responded.

   “Stop it, both of you.  This minute,” Belle ordered.  She didn’t raise her voice, but both Regina and Neal looked away from each other.

   “Regina, we know you’re shocked and upset.  It’s been a trying few days for everyone.”  Belle pulled out a chair for her.  “Sit down, please.”

   After a moment the ex-queen did as she was bade, carefully arranging her skirts around her.

   “Regina, did you tell David where you were going before you left?”  Belle asked.

   “Of course I did.”  She shrugged.  “Not that it really registered.  He’s half out of his mind with worry over Snow and the baby…”

   “Snow’s pregnant again?”  Rumple asked his son.

   “Yes, and her due date’s coming up soon,” Neal informed him.  “Wherever the Dark Fairy’s got Snow stashed she’s hidden even better than you were.”

   “Mulan and your Amazon friends,” here Regina shot a glance at Belle, “are holding the northern crossroads, when they’re not picking fights with the peasants or complaining about how the male soldiers smell.”

   “The Amazons have been worthwhile allies and have acquitted themselves bravely on the battlefield,” Robin said from the entryway.  They all turned; no one had heard him come in.  A small boy hung on his arm.

   But Robin was glaring at Regina.  Evidently he’d heard her unkind comments.  “Those who do not wield swords should not stand in judgment of those who do.”

   It was the closest thing to an insult Rumple had ever heard out of Robin’s mouth.

   “We wouldn’t even need the Amazons if we’d been able to raise enough troops from the locals,” Regina protested.  But Rumple couldn’t help but notice she looked a little uncomfortable under Robin’s steely glare.

   “The peasants in these lands have had three years of poor harvests followed by harsh winters and ogre attacks.  Many have been injured.  Others are malnourished, or sick.  Most have never been armed with more than a pitchfork in their lives.  And you expect these men to take on a fresh army from another realm?”  Robin seemed to genuinely want an answer.

   Regina just looked away.

   Robin did not seem surprised by this.  Evidently there was no love lost between the ex-thief and the former queen.

   “Lady Belle, Roland wanted to say goodbye to you before he leaves on his journey.” Robin smiled down at his son.

   “I don’t want to leave, Papa,” the child protested.  “I want to stay here and fight.”

   Belle held out her arms for the child.  She gave him a hug and kissed the top of his head.  “You’re a brave boy, Roland.  But you need to do as your papa tells you.”  She cupped his little face in his hands.  “Prince Eric is a good friend of mine.  You’ll like him very much.”

   “And he knows mermaids?”  Roland asked hopefully.  He and Belle had clearly discussed this before.

   “One very special mermaid in particular,” Belle promised.  “Keep studying your letters while you’re in the south.”

   “I will, Belle, I promise.”

   Neal also hugged the child.  Rumple couldn’t help but see the wistful look on his son’s face.  No doubt he was missing Henry.

   Neal then pointed out Rumple to the little one.  “Roland, this is my papa.  I told you about him, remember?” 

   “Why’s he in bed during the day?”  The boy asked.

   “He hurt his leg and he has to rest,” Neal told him.  “Just like you did when you were sick a few weeks ago.” 

   As Neal spoke Rumple was reminded again of what a natural Neal was as a father.  Rumple prayed silently to whatever gods were listening that Neal would someday have the chance to parent his own son again.

   “Oh.”  To his credit the child didn’t seem frightened of the much older man, instead solemnly shaking Rumple’s hand.

   “Papa says you are a great sorcerer,” Roland observed in his piping little voice.

   “I was, once.  Now I’m just a man.”

   “Oh.”  The boy thought about this for a moment.  “Still, that’s not a bad thing to be.  My papa's just a man but he's the bravest man in the whole Forest."  

   Rumple let himself chuckle a bit.  “He is, indeed.  Safe journey, child.”

   Robin held out his hand, clearly expecting his son to join him.  But Roland had paused in front of Regina.

   “Goodbye, Regina,” he said.  “We may not see each other for a long time, but it was very nice to meet you.”

  Regina blinked hard, as if she’d been lost in thought for a moment.  She smiled at the boy. 

   “Roland, I’ve enjoyed getting to know you, too, over the last few months.  Oh, I almost forgot!  I have a going away present for you.”

   “You do?”  He asked excitedly.

   “Yes.”  She quickly waved one hand over the other, and from a cloud of blue smoke there appeared a medium-sized box.

   Roland looked hopefully at his father.  Robin did not look happy, but he finally nodded. 

   Roland opened it and cried out with joy.  It was a set of blocks.  He held one up to show it off the fanciful carvings on each side.  “Papa, look!”  He exclaimed.  “It’s the alphabet!”

   “Study hard, and learn all your letters while you’re away,” Regina told him.  “Just like Belle said.  Ok?”

   “I will.  I promise.” The child threw his small arms around the sorceress.  Regina looked surprised, but she quickly folded him into her embrace.

   “Time to go, son,” Robin said gently.

   Rumple could tell Regina was reluctant to let the child go.  But she finally did, smoothing his dark hair.

   “Safe travels, Roland,” she told him.  Rumple might have been imagining it, but he could have sworn he heard a catch in Regina’s voice as she spoke.

   Everyone waved one last goodbye, and Robin led the child back outside.

   “I’m going to miss him,” Belle admitted.  “Children have a wonderful way of lightening things up.”

   “Yeah, and it was nice to have at least one male around the Amazons were willing to tolerate,” Neal observed.

   “We’re wasting time with all this sentimentality.”  Regina stood up again, her face once again a perfect mask of ego and scorn.  “I’ve got to get back to Charming and let him know we’re not going to be able to count on Rumple for any help.”

   “Thank you for the vote of confidence.”

   Regina glared back at him.  “Autumn’s coming, Rumple.  The Dark Fairy’s troops will be more aggressive now, trying to mount as many offensives as they can before winter.  You had better start working on getting your magic back, or none of us are going to live long enough to see the spring.”

   And with that gloomy declaration Storybrooke’s former mayor swept out of the tent and was gone in a puff of smoke.

* * *

 

   In his days as a poor peasant, and later as the Dark One, and even as Mr. Gold, Rumplestiltskin had always had his spinning wheel to keep him company.  No matter how tired, how discouraged, or how full of despair he had been spinning had always soothed him and helped to pass the time.

   There was no spinning wheel to be found in the army camp, of course.  After a week of convalescing in bed he was frustrated and bored.  Belle and Neal did their best to keep him entertained, but they both had duties that needed attention.

    Belle often attended meetings between Melanippe and her officers. With her quick mind, her interest in virtually everything, and her personal acquaintance with David, Regina, Mulan, and the other leaders, she was proving adept at strategy and planning. 

   Neal was working with Robin’s men.  They had spread out across the area south of camp to help protect and guide refugees trying to move out of the path of the fighting.  He also carried information and dispatches between Melanippe, David, and Prince Phillip and Princess Aurora, who, Rumple gathered, were serving as sort of a government in exile for the war-torn parts of the country.

   It was Neal’s work that led Rumple to make his own small contribution to the war effort.  One afternoon while he was drinking his tea and waiting for Belle to return from wherever she’d gotten to Neal appeared with a rolled map tucked under one arm.

   “Got a minute?”

   “For you?  Always.” 

   They smiled at one another.  Rumple knew he and Neal were still finding their way around this new relationship.  He was the first to admit he didn’t know the man his son had become very well.  But so far they seemed to be muddling through.

   Neal unrolled the map and laid it in his father’s lap. 

   Rumple bent over to study it.  It was a map of the Enchanted Forest, the kind he’d often seen in war rooms over the centuries.  But this one was hand drawn, with many dotted and dashed lines added in odd places.  He indicated them with his free hand.

   “What are those markings?”

   “Trails and paths that don’t appear on any official maps of this land,” Neal informed him.  “The one advantage we have over the Dark Fairy—and, according to the Amazons, the only one—is that we know this land and terrain and she doesn’t.  Her armies move mainly along the Great Western Road and its connectors.  So we keep our people off of them as much as possible.”

   “Where are we now?”  The old sorcerer asked.  “I haven’t been able to get my bearings since I’ve been here.”

   “Here.”  Neal indicated a point not far from the border with the Frontlands where both Rumple and his son had once lived. 

   “Two days ride from our location the Western Road breaks and turns south.  David is massing his forces and part of Mel’s there to try and push the Dark army back.  But the woods are heavy around there.  It’s slowing down their movements.”

   “A while back I suggested we use some of the old trails around there our village used to use to move sheep to market, Papa,” Neal told him.  “I don’t remember them being very wide, but they’re wide enough for soldiers moving one or two abreast.  Right now I’m trying to locate one in particular, but I’m having a rough time.” 

     He ran his finger down to a spot on the map.  “I think it was right around here.  I remember there was this pile of moss-covered rocks near the start we used as a landmark…”

   Rumple nodded in understanding.

   Neal cleared his throat.  “So I got to thinking that you could find it a lot easier than I could.  You grew up in this area, too.  But after all you lived here a hell of a lot longer than I did, both before and after you became the Dark One.”  Neal smiled ruefully.  “Seriously, I should have thought of having you help earlier.”

   Rumple thought this over for a moment.  “Of course I’ll do anything I can to help, Neal.”  He bent down over the map again. 

   “You’ve got the spot about right.  But the path turned here, at a little creek, so that the animals could be watered.  Then it ran parallel to the Western Road but perhaps a mile from it.”

   Neal’s son grinned.  “Oh, yeah, I remember that creek.  Morraine and I played in it on that one trip when the weather got so hot, remember?  There were tadpoles and water skimmers in it.”

   “I do.  I also recall that Morraine’s father yelled at you both for getting your clothes soaking wet when neither of you had dry ones to change into.” 

     Rumple smiled a bit at the memory.  Morraine’s parents had been among the few of their neighbors who had been kind to them.  Her father had once let Rumple and Bae accompany them on the journey so Rumple could sell the extra thread he had spun at a higher price than he could command in their own village.  The few extra coppers he’d earned that trip had helped him and Bae survive the winter.

  “You were about eight, I think,” he added.

   “That sounds right.”

     Before he started to get maudlin, as he often still did when he thought about his son’s childhood, the former sorcerer turned his attention back to the map. 

   “There was also a path smugglers used that cut through the woods here and here,” he pointed to a slightly different spot.  “They used those to evade King George’s excise men.  Not that they could evade the Dark One, of course.  I always used to demand a percentage…”

   Neal nudged his arm.  Rumple looked down to see that he was holding a quill and a small bottle of ink.  He looked excited.

   “Show me, Papa.  Sketch in everything you can remember.  If you’re right, and if we can get this map to David, and if he can get his forces in place in time it might be just enough to get back control of the Great Western Road.”

   “That’s an awful lot of ‘ifs,’ Neal.”

   “I know.  But if we can control the Road we can win this war.”

   The map Rumple created that day Neal personally delivered to Prince Charming.  It didn’t look anything like traditional maps of the region.  It was so criss-crossed with markings it was a bit hard to read. 

   But it quickly proved so useful that Rumple and Belle often sat up late in the evenings creating additional copies that were sent to their allies all across the Forest. 

   And that was how the man once known as Rumplestiltskin the coward joined the War Against the Dark Fairy. 

* * *

 

   September gave way to October.  Not that any of the people of the Forest called it October.  To them it was the Month of the Harvest Moon, which at night hung low and round in the sky.

   When he wasn’t map-making Rumple worked on his magic.  Regina had been right about one thing: he would better be able to protect those he loved if he had his magic back.

   The problem was that the Dark One’s magic had been fueled by anger, fear, resentment, and jealousy.  That was why it had been so powerful, and so corrupting.  That in turn was the kind of magic he had taught Cora and Regina, gods forgive him.

   He was no longer full of those emotions.  He felt fear, yes, for his own safety and that of his son and of Belle.  But it was a healthy fear, the same fear everyone allied against the Dark Fairy from the West felt.

   Without those powerful negative emotions magic was proving much harder to generate.  With a great deal of focus and energy he could eventually conjure very small items—an apple, a pen.  For an ordinary human he knew that was a good start.  But for one who had been the Dark One the results were always disappointing.  Worse still, the effort of so doing any magic at all wore him out.   

   He hoped that as he continued to recover physically his magic would also get stronger.  But he felt certain that it wouldn’t be in time to be of any help in the war effort.

   “It’s all a bit ironic,” Rumple observed to Neal one morning as the healer, who he’d discovered was appropriately named Agrippa, at long last took the splint off his leg.  She replaced it with a smaller brace that would permit him to hobble around while the bones continued to heal. 

   “This whole thing started because I wanted to keep you out of a war.  And here you are, in the middle of a different one.”

   “It’s not the same, Papa,” Neal protested.  “Throwing a bunch of scared kids in front of an ogre army was just plain wrong.  I’m in this now because I chose to be.  Something good has to come out of being separated from Emma and Henry.”

   “You’ll see them again,” Rumple promised as for the first time in many days he stood shakily on his own two feet. 

   Neal shrugged his shoulders.  Then his expression brightened a bit as he watched his father take a few limping steps.  “Wow, that takes me back.”

   “Keep wearing the brace for the next month or two and the limp won’t be permanent,” Agrippa vowed.  “This leg may always be weaker than your other one, and it may trouble you in cold weather and on stairs.  But I’ve put legs more damaged than yours back together again, and this one will be no different.”

   “Thank you,” Rumple said with genuine feeling. 

     He could still remember the healers who’d sneered at him in disgust and refused to treat his self-inflicted wound during the First Ogre Wars.  He could remember the agony of limping on the grinding broken bones all the way home, desperate to get back to his wife and to the son he’d not yet seen.  He was resigned to being fully human now, to growing old—well, older--but at least he wouldn’t do so completely crippled.

   “That reminds me,” Neal added after Agrippa left.  “I had Robin send for something from the Dark Castle.” Neal ducked out of the tent and returned a moment later with a staff in his hand.  “Recognize this?”

   Rumple took the wood, polished from many years of handling, into his hands. 

   Neal studied his father’s expression carefully.  “You don’t have to use it if you don’t want to.  I can probably fix you up a cane if you’d prefer.  But, I thought, maybe…”

   “No, Neal, no—it was very thoughtful of you.  And I will need it, at least for a time.  I just can’t believe it was still there!”

   “The last time I was there I showed Robin how you’d enchanted it with blood magic.  After that I don’t think he even wanted to handle the thing.  He’s not a big fan of magic or of the people who practice it.”

   “So I noticed when Regina was here.”

   “Yeah, you should see him butting heads with her in strategy meetings,” Neal said with a laugh.  “Boy, do sparks fly!”

   Rumple leaned experimentally on the staff.  It bought back many memories—some good, some bad.  But it did indeed help him balance so he could walk across the small space without falling.

   “Neal?”  Belle asked as she entered the tent.  “Ah, there you are!  He’s here, Melanippe,” she called over her shoulder. 

   She smiled widely at Rumple.  “And look who’s up and around!”

   He smiled back at her. 

   They’d both agreed that they wanted to be married as soon as possible.  It was proving a bit complicated.  Most of the clerics in the area, including Robin Hood’s friend Friar Tuck, had gone south to help care for refugees. 

   Under the laws of the land a king or prince could also perform the ceremony.  But they’d mutually decided that demanding either Prince Phillip or Prince Charming drop the important work they were doing to travel to the camp would be unacceptable.

   They’d also agreed to wait until their wedding night to become lovers again.  Waiting was going to be a bigger challenge than he’d expected, however. 

   It had seemed an easy enough promise for Rumple to make when he’d been flat on his back in bed.  Privacy was limited in the camp anyway.  With people popping in and out of the tent at all hours it just wasn’t practical.

   But now that he was feeling better and back on his feet he was already regretting his promise.  She looked both adorable and delectable in her leather tunic and in the trousers that showed off her shapely legs.  Just now her hair was messy, her eyes were bright, and there was a smear of dirt on her cheek. 

   He’d never seen her look lovelier.

   “What have you been up to?”  He asked Belle as Melanippe followed her into the tent.

   “Sparring practice.”  When he raised his eyebrows in alarm she laughed. 

   “Neal and Mulan actually started teaching me sword fighting a while ago.  Melanippe is just helping me with my form.  But don’t worry—it’s for defensive purposes only.  I still have too much of a tendency to trip over my own feet to be in combat.”

   “A problem that could be rectified with enough practice,” the Amazon corrected.  “In Scythia we begin training our daughters to fight as soon as they can walk.  Maurice should have seen to it.”

   “I’m more than a quarter century behind, then,” Belle chuckled.  “And Father would never have dreamed of putting a sword in my hand.  More’s the pity.”

   “Where _is_ your father, Belle?”  Rumple asked.  “You’ve never said.  Is he well?”

   She nodded.  “He went with Marco and some of the others to Prince Phillip’s court.  He’s helping keep things organized on that end.”  She sighed.  “When I got back from Scythia I sent him a long letter.  He didn’t write back to me.  But he wrote to Melanippe.”

   “He’s very angry with me,” the older woman explained.  “He thinks I’ll put Isabelle in danger.”

   “That sounds familiar,” Rumple said tartly.

   “Maurice was always over-cautious.  He was a fair enough hand with a sword, mind.  But nothing like Isabelle’s mother.”  She smiled at her niece.

   Rumple blinked in surprise.  “I didn’t realize you and Belle’s father ever actually met.”

   “We did.  It’s a long story.  Right now there are other pressing matters to which we must attend.”

     “What’s up?”  Neal asked.

    “We’ve received word that the Dark Fairy’s army will reach the crossroads the day after tomorrow, at the very latest.  As you all know there they will be ambushed by David’s forces.  I am sending another centuria, under the command of one of my lieutenants, to join up with them.  With luck they will push the army back to the west, and this part of the Forest will be free once again.  That will leave us less than a hundred soldiers here.  It is likely that when the Dark army is routed they will flee southward.”

   “South?” Belle looked alarmed.  “There will be villages in their path.  The last I heard some of the people we used to know in Storybrooke had settled in that area.”

   “I am aware of that.  So we will move southwest, to be in position should we be needed.  Robin and his men will be doing the same to the southeast.  We must move quickly.”  She eyed Rumple’s leg.  “Will you be able to ride like that?”

   “I’m not much of a horseman,” Rumple admitted.  Even that was an exaggeration.  He’s always been too poor to keep a horse, and of course the Dark One had never needed one.

   “He’ll manage just fine,” Belle said staunchly.

   “Good.”  Melanippe nodded firmly.  “Be ready to move at dawn.”

 

   

 


	3. Ch 3

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Rumple continues to tell his daughter the tale of the Autumn Bride. In this installment Mulan and Archie have cameos, Jefferson and Mel have the opposite of a meet-cute, and Rumple and Belle are still too busy fighting a war to get their wedding scheduled.

   On the morning the army broke camp Rumple was genuinely alarmed when Belle arrived with a young warrior by her side.  Belle was leading an enormous white war horse by its reins.  The girl carried a mounting block in her gaunleted hands. 

   “Rumple, this is Hecate, and the horse is named Agamemnon,” Belle told him.  “I call him ‘Aggie’ for short.” 

   She produced the nub of a carrot from a pocket and fed the animal.  It snorted happily at her as it munched.

   “You don’t actually expect me to climb all the way up there, do you?”  He asked while eyeing the horse skeptically.

   Belle laughed.  “Aggie’s one of the oldest horses in camp, Rumple, and he’s really well trained.  Smart, too.  I’m sure we will manage.” 

   She nodded at the girl next to her, who couldn’t have been more than twelve.  “Hecate’s here to help, too, isn’t that right?”

   “Yes, ma’am,” the child said obediently.  She was an unprepossessing creature, with straw colored hair that stuck out from her head at odd angles and a thin frame.  But she surveyed Rumple with the practiced eye of an experienced horsewoman.

   “Whenever you need to mount or dismount I’ll be there to help,” Hecate told him.   

   Rumple heaved a sigh.  It wasn’t manly to need help, but he had no other choice.  Melanippe and her officers were already on horseback and waiting.

   With the mounting block and a little help from Belle he was able to pull himself up and into the saddle.  The horse snorted indignantly as Rumple took the reins but to his relief did not buck him off.

   Belle pulled on her own rucksack and mounted behind him.  Rumple’s walking stick rested on the saddle behind her.  That, and the clothes on their backs, was the sum total of their worldly possessions at the moment. 

   He couldn’t help but think of the big Victorian house they’d left behind in the other world.  He’d always wanted to bring Belle there as a bride, so she’d be surrounded with beautiful things as she deserved.  Now, even if they managed to find someone to marry them, they’d be starting over from scratch.

   All around them the Amazons were forming into ranks and preparing to march behind the horses.  Hecate nodded politely to them and then hurried off to join them.

    “She’s awfully young, isn’t she?”  Rumple said quietly to Belle.  “Too young to fight in a war.”

   “Hecate is still being trained; she’s not a soldier yet,” Belle told him.  “She’s Melanippe’s page.  Mel and the other officers will make sure Hecate stays clear of any battles for a few more years yet.”

   Rumple sighed in relief.  Belle gave his ribcage an gentle but affectionate squeeze, careful to avoid his recent injury.

   “It’s sweet of you to be concerned, Rumple—I was too, until Mel explained it to me.  Mel was my mother’s page when she was that age, you know.”

   “Really?  Hmmm.” 

   Rumple had still not exchanged more than a handful of words with Melanippe.  They were never alone together, and he worried that if Mel did get to know him she wouldn’t like him.  Few people did, after all.  He feared he’d end up with yet another relation that couldn’t stand the sight of him. 

   He didn’t want that to happen, at least not yet.  Belle was still getting to know her aunt but was clearly already deeply fond of her.  Rumple fervently hoped he wouldn’t become a source of friction between the two women. 

* * *

 

   The army traveled for the better part of two days, sticking to the old roads through the forest he had helped map.  They stopped for only a few hours each night, sleeping on the ground and letting Aggie and the other horses rest and graze.

   Soon Rumple’s leg hurt, as did his back and his backside from long hours in the saddle.  But he knew better than to complain.  For one thing, most of the Amazons traveled on foot.  And for another, Belle was riding behind him, her arms wrapped around his waist and her face, more often than not, resting against his shoulder. 

   That alone was enough to make up for much of his physical discomfort.

   On the early morning of the third day the column came to an abrupt halt.  The sky was still a dark blue overhead, and Rumple had to squint through the darkness to see why they had stopped.  Belle, who’d been dozing snuggled against his back, woke up quickly.

   “What is it?”  She whispered in his ear.

   “A rider approaching through the underbrush.  Just one, thank the gods.  I can just make out his shape,” he whispered back.

   All around them they could hear the distinctive sounds of swords being drawn from leather sheaths.  Several columns moved forward to the right and left of the riders to protect them.  Everyone seemed to be holding their breaths.

   “Greetings, Melanippe,” the rider said out of the darkness as he approached.  “I have been riding these woods for some time waiting for you.”

   “I know that voice!”  Belle gasped.  “Rumple, move up—I want to see her!”

   Puzzled, he did as he was bade, nudging their horse into action.  He paused when they were just to the right and behind the commander.

   The rider was indeed a woman.  She’d pulled back her hood now.  In the dim light he could see long, dark hair and the distinctive facial features of someone from the east.

   “You were not expected, but you are welcome,” Mel told the other woman cordially, clearing recognizing the newcomer. 

   Mel glanced over her shoulder at her niece.  “I believe you and Belle know one another?”  She added.

   “We do, indeed,” the dark-haired woman said.

   “Mulan, I’m so glad to see you!  How are you?”  Belle asked.

   “As well as can be expected, under the circumstances,” the warrior told her.  “Busy.  I’ve heard you have been, as well.”  Her dark eyes fell on Rumplestiltskin.  “That’s him?”

   “It is.  Mulan, this is Rumplestiltskin.  Rumple, this is Mulan.”

   He regarded Mulan silently for a moment. She stared back at him.

   “It’s nice to meet you,” he finally offered.  “I’ve always wanted to thank you for being such a good friend to Belle when she needed one,” he admitted.

   The young woman surveyed him skeptically.

   “This is the Beast that cast you out?”  She asked Belle.

   “He was.  That was a long time ago.  He’s not a Beast anymore,” Bell said firmly.

    “You are human now?”  Mulan asked him.

   “I am, yes,” Rumple told her.

   “Good.  Then know this—if you ever hurt her again I will run you through with my sword.  Understood?”

   He blinked.

   “Understood.  Although I think at this point you would have to stand in line to kill me if any further harm ever came to Belle.  And my son would be in the very front of that line.”

   Mulan nodded.  “I’ve no doubt Neal would be, yes.  I just wanted to make certain we are clear.”  

   She cleared her throat.  “I bring news and a visitor from the front,” she announced.

    The Amazons looked about them in confusion, for by all appearances Mulan was traveling alone.  From beneath her cloak Mulan produced a small iron cage, no bigger than an apple. 

     Perched inside of it was Archie—or Jiminy, as he was known in this world.  He was dressed in a green coat and was holding his hat in his front set of legs.  He had a tiny paper megaphone with him.  When he spoke through it the humans could hear him without straining.

   “You two are a sight for sore eyes!”  The cricket said to Belle and Rumple as Mulan held him up in the dawning light.  “Regina told us about what had happened, but…How are you feeling, Rumple?”

   _Once a therapist, always a therapist_ , Rumple thought.  

   “I’m fine, Archie, thank you.  I see you’ve managed to not get stepped on,” he replied.  “Are you in some sort of jail?”

   “Among my people crickets are considered extremely good luck,” Mulan explained.  “It’s not uncommon for us to carry them about in these small cages.”

   “With all the horses tromping about we figured better safe than sorry,” the cricket said with a shrug of his shoulders.

   “That’s very wise,” Belle told him. 

   “I have an official communique from the Prince,” Archie said proudly.  “Where is Melanippe?”

   “Here.”  The commander nudged her horse forward again.  She took the small cage and set it in the flat of her palm, so they could all listen.  Melanippe and Archie had met before, Rumple knew.  If the other Amazons were at all surprised at the sight of a talking cricket they did not show it.

   “Prince Charming sends his complements to the Amazons and wishes to inform them that the Dark Fairy’s army has been routed and is fleeing south, as predicted.” Archie spoke in the rather formal tone he had used as an adviser to Charming and Snow back in the old days.  “Commander, your forces under Lieutenant Marpesia fought bravely.  They have done their sisters proud.” 

   The Amazons were too well trained to cry out or celebrate.  But judging by their whispers this happy news was being passed quickly down the line.

  Melanippe refused to be distracted.  She looked sharply from Archie to Mulan and back again.  “Casualties?”

   “As yet unknown,” Mulan told her. 

   “The Prince requests that you and your current force protect the villages to the south of the crossroads.  He understands your desire to treat your own wounded and will arrange for any Amazon casualties to be brought to you.”

   “Agreed.  Location?”

   “There is a small farming village half a league south of the crossroads,” the cricket said.  “We believe the civilians living there, including some of our own people, made it safely to the woods before the fighting started.  We do not know what condition the buildings are in.  Supplies will be provided if you need them.”

   “Tell the Prince we will make do,” Melanippe replied. 

   Archie cocked his tiny head to one side.  “The Prince realizes he now has no remaining claim over your troops.  But he respectfully requests you to allow them to stay with the main force for the time being, under the command of Marpesia and with Mulan continuing to serve as liaison.”

   “That would not be my first choice.”  The commander looked thoughtful.  “Why does Charming ask this of me?”  

   Archie cleared his throat proudly.  “The Princess Snow has been safely recovered.”

   “She has?”  Belle’s voice was urgent: she had always been very fond of Mary-Margaret.  “She was rescued?”

   “Well, actually, it appears she freed herself,” said the cricket.

   Rumple chuckled.  “Of course she did.”

   “And the baby?”  Belle anxiously squeezed Rumple's shoulder as she spoke.

   The little creature drew himself to his full height of a few inches.  “She was safely delivered of a son yesterday evening.”

   “Oh, Archie, how wonderful!”  Belle’s warm breath tickled Rumple’s ear.  “Do send them our congratulations!”

   “Thank you, Lady Belle.”  Archie turned back to Melanippe.  “As soon as they can be moved the Prince would like to personally deliver his wife and the infant prince to safety with Prince Phillip and Princess Aurora.”

   Melanippe was clearly thinking this over.  She finally glanced over at Mulan.  “Was this plan shared with my lieutenant?”

   “It was.  She said to tell you she agrees, provided you give your consent.  She will abide by your decision.”  Mulan nodded her head.  “I also agree to stay and to serve.”

   After a long moment Melanippe sighed.  “My Queen will not like this.  But very well.  Cricket, tell the Prince I agree to these terms.  Once he returns he is to meet me at this village you spoke of with the rest of my centuriae and to return them to my personal command.”

   Archie nodded and place his hat on his head.  “I will.  Thank you.”

   “Don’t thank me,” the woman told him grimly.  “Not until I know how many of my troops yet live.”

* * *

 

   Muan and Archie accompanied them as they rode through the remaining hours of early morning.  Rumple felt a knot form deep in his stomach.  He had seen battlefields before, hundreds of them.  But he was dreading what they might see now.  Most of all he did not want Belle to see the death and destruction such actions usually left in their wake.

  Fortunately because they were south of where the main action had occurred the field was not littered with bodies as he had feared it would be.  But there were buildings smoldering on either side of the narrow road, and up ahead he could see an even larger plume of smoke.

   “The village Charming speaks of is there,” Mulan pointed to a narrow wagon-track that rolled across stubbly fields.  “Archie and I will go into the woods, see if we can find any of the locals and let them know it’s safe to come out of hiding.  Then we will return to the rest of the forces to the north.  Send word if you need anything.”

   Melanippe was already staring at the landscape ahead of them, no doubt thinking about how to deploy her small force.  “I will,” she said shortly.

   Before Mulan could ride away Belle signaled to her again.  Rumple eased their horse out of line so they could converse without holding up the rest of the soldiers.

   “Mulan, Neal is with Robin Hood and his men somewhere east of here,” Belle told her friend.

   The dark-haired woman nodded in understanding.  “If I see him I will tell him where you are.”

   “Please…”  Rumple allowed himself to smile a tiny bit.  “Tell him to stay safe.”

   “I will.”  She spurred her horse and galloped away.  Soon she and Archie were just a small dot on the horizon.

   Rumple and Belle arrived in what was left of the small village a few minutes after the rest of Melanippe’s soldiers.  She was busy giving orders, sending women to guard the perimeter in case there were any stragglers from the Dark Fairy’s army in the area.

   Belle slid down from Aggie’s back.  Rumple was relieved to see young Hecate appear with a bale of hay to make it easier for him to dismount.

   Once he was safely back on the ground Belle reached out and took his hand.  They looked around them in silence.  Most of the dozen or so buildings around the town square had some degree of damage.  Even the chapel had suffered.  Its doors hung askew and its bell tower had toppled to the ground. 

   “How…?”  Belle asked.

   “Ogres,” Rumple replied.  “They must have had ogres with them.”

   “Get those fires out,”  Melanippe ordered soldiers, pointing to several smoldering buildings.  “The fields are full of dry straw and we don’t want them to spread.”

   She turned to another group.  “Take the Healers and go north; meet the Prince’s troops.  Any of our wounded that can be moved, bring them here.  If they cannot be moved treat them where they lay.  Understood?”

   “Yes, Commander,” said one officer as she led her group back to their horses.

   Belle approached her aunt.  “What can we do to help?”

   Rumple half expected the Amazon to tell them to just stay out of their way.  But instead Mel looked thoughtful.

   “We will have wounded arriving soon.  I do not know how many.  They will need pallets, fresh water…”

   Belle nodded in understanding.  “We’re on it.”

   “Take Hecate and Cassandra with you to help.”  Mel pointed to her page and to a young, rather sullen-looking soldier.  “Cassandra is training to be a Healer; she’ll know what else you need.” 

   She eyed the two young Amazons.  “I am going to ride the perimeter and make sure everything is secure.  You will both follow Belle’s orders until I return.”

   She mounted her horse.  Belle nodded to her, and a moment later the four of them were alone again.

   Belle rolled up her sleeves.  “All right, then.  We’re going to need sheets and blankets.  Towels to tear up into bandages if we run out.  Hecate, you go into any house still safe to enter.  Gather up whatever you can find and bring it to me.  I’ll get things sorted.”

   The child nodded and hurried off.

   “Where are we going to put the wounded?”  Cassandra asked Belle in a challenging tone.  “We’re out in the open here.”

   Rumple got the sense that this woman did not like Belle giving her orders. 

   Belle glanced around her.  “The chapel and the buildings on either side of it are still standing.  Let’s see what kind of shape they’re in.”

   The interior of the chapel was dark and cool.  The pews had all been piled to one side as if something large had moved through the space and shoved them out of its way.  There was a thick layer of plaster dust over everything but the roof was still intact.

   They had better luck with what had been the local tavern.  There was still food and spilled tankards of ale on the tables, testimony to how quickly the patrons had fled.  But the space was reasonably clean.

   “We’ll bring them in here,” Belle said, studying the space with her hands on her hips.  “We should be able to put at least two dozen patients in here if you’ll help me shift the tables out of the way, Cassandra.”

   The other woman sniffed, but she didn’t contradict Belle.  Instead she glared at Rumplestiltskin.

   “And what will _he_ be doing while we work?”

   Belle turned to Rumple.  She looked at him with slightly raised brows. 

   He knew what she was doing.  She was trying to give him a graceful way out if he did not feel well enough to help.   He refused to take it.

   “I’ll start drawing fresh water from the well and filling all the cisterns,” he offered.  “We’ll need it.”

   She smiled proudly at him.  “That’s a good idea.  Thank you for thinking of it.”

   Soon the wounded who were still ambulatory arrived.  They came in twos and threes, many supporting each other as they walked.  Rumple had always heard Amazons were hard to kill.  Seeing these wounded women still on their feet now he certainly believed it.

   Belle and Hecate got each soldier settled on a clean blanket or sheet.  Rumple paused in his work and went from bed to bed giving them cool water to drink or a damp cloth for their heads.  Cassandra busied herself building a fire in the hearth and getting a large kettle of water boiling.

   Most of the wounds were what one might expect to see: slashes from swords, holes left by arrows.  He and Belle rinsed dirt from the wounds as best they could.  Hecate and Cassandra applied temporary dressings.  Rumple remembered quite clearly the screams of wounded soldiers being treated, if one could call it that, during the First Ogre War.  But none of these soldiers so much as whimpered.

   Villagers were beginning to return as well.  Most looked unhurt, but all were clearly shocked by events and by the state of their little town.  They huddled in the town square.  Women wept.  Their menfolk stood by with grim expressions. 

   Belle walked among them, speaking in her gentlest voice and explaining to them what was happening.  On Belle’s orders Hecate rifled through the tavern’s storeroom and found bread, cheese, and apples, which were distributed to the hungry village children.

   Soon Rumple’s leg ached fiercely.  But he continued to move back and forth to the well, pulling up water to keep their supplies replenished.   While reeling up the bucket yet again he looked up to see a tall, rather rangy figure staggering towards the village out of the fields, something clutched in his arms.

   Startled, he let go of the crank and the bucket went careening back into the water below.  Belle had mentioned some of their former neighbors lived in the area, but this was probably the absolute last person he would have expected to see.

   Fortunately at that moment Belle also spotted the scarecrow-like figure.

   “Jefferson?”  She breathed aloud.  She rushed over to him.  “What is it?  What happened?”

   Rumple joined them as quickly as his leg would allow.  He felt sick when he realized the Hatter was carrying the limp form of his daughter, Grace.  The child’s fair hair was full of dirt and there was blood dripping down the side of her face.

   Jefferson’s eyes were wide and his face was white.  He looked wildly from Belle to Rumple as if not entirely sure who they were.

   “Jefferson, it’s me,” Belle said to him softly.  “Can you tell me what happened?  What happened to Grace?”

   “Ogres.  A…wall..collapsed,” he was finally able to stutter out.  “Couldn’t get her out of the way fast enough…we’ve been hiding in the woods…”

   Rumple leaned over and put a hand near Grace’s mouth.  To his relief he felt warm breath brush against his skin.

   “She’s still breathing,” he told Belle.  “Let’s get her inside.”

   Belle steered Jefferson by the shoulder and Rumple held onto one of his arms.  But before they could enter the tavern Cassandra blocked their path.

   “What are you doing?  He can’t come in here!”

   “He’s a friend of ours, and his daughter has been injured.  She needs to be treated.  Now move,” Rumple said through gritted teeth.

   But the other woman stood stubbornly in the way.  “We are treating our own wounded here.  Not outsiders’.”

   “Oh, for goodness sakes!  This child needs help!”  Belle told her.  “What sort of a Healer are you?”

   “He cannot come in.”  Cassandra folded her arms.  “He can leave the child here…”

   This made Jefferson rear back in fear. 

   “Nobody’s taking my daughter from me!”  He clutched the girl closer to his chest, and she moaned.  “Nobody…”

   Belle tried to soothe him.  “That’s not what she meant, Jefferson.  Hush now—you don’t want to hurt Grace!” 

   She shot Rumple a desperate look.  No one from outside Storybrooke could possibly understand why Jefferson so feared having his daughter removed from his arms, and Cassandra was clearly not going to be a sympathetic ear. 

   Rumple wished his staff wasn’t still propped up against the side of the well several feet away.  He could feel magic tingling down his arm, drawn by the growing anger inside of him. 

   “Get out of our way now, dearie, or…”

   “Or you’ll what?”  The woman sneered.

   “What is the meaning of this?”  A new voice broke in.  Melanippe was coming towards them, handing the reigns of her horse off to Hecate as she walked.

   “Mel…”  Belle began desperately.

   But the older woman held up a hand to stop her.  She was focused on her fellow Amazon.  “I asked you a question, soldier.”

   Cassandra looked a little nervous, but she stuck out her chin. 

   “We are treating our wounded, as you ordered, Commander.  Although I am willing to treat the girl-child I refuse to let this man in.  He is not being reasonable.” 

   Her lip curled in distaste.  “Is it not enough we’ve had men in our camp…?”  She trailed off.

   “Precisely,” Melanippe said after a moment.  “We’ve had men in our camp for several months now.  At this point one more cannot possibly make a difference.  Step aside.”

   Cassandra seemed to shrink.  “Yes, Commander.”

   “And go and fetch Agrippa.  I want her here in ten minutes, am I understood?”

   “Yes, Commander.”  As Cassandra slunk away Melanippe turned to face them.

   “Give the child to me,” she said to Jefferson, holding out her arms.

   Jefferson pulled away again.  “No!  I…”

   “Look at me,” she said to him in the softest tone Rumple had ever heard her use.  “You can see I mean your child no harm.  She needs help.  Let me help her.”

   Belle placed a gentle hand on Jefferson’s shoulder.  “You can trust her.  Go on.”

   After a moment Jefferson’s face fell.  He reluctantly handed Grace to Melanippe. 

   She carried the child inside, with Belle, Jefferson and Rumple all on her heels.

   They found an empty pallet, and Mel laid Grace down.  Rumple quickly fetched a bowl of water and a clean cloth. Belle stood next to Jefferson with her arms around him, both to support him and to make sure he didn’t interfere.

   As soon as a wet cloth touched her forehead the child’s eyes blinked open.

   “Hello,” the woman bent over her said with a slight smile.  “I’m Melanippe.  Can you tell me your name?”

   “G-Grace.  My head hurts.”

   Jefferson let out a quiet sob.

   “I know your head hurts, but I need you to stay still for a little while longer.  Grace is an excellent name,” Mel said approvingly.  As she spoke her hands were moving along the child’s arms and legs, checking for injuries. 

   “In our temples in Scythia we honor the all the graces.  On feast days we light candles for them and bring them offerings of food.  Tell me: do you know what each grace represents?”  Melanippe asked as she began to wipe away dried blood from the girl’s forehead.

   “Charm, beauty, nature, creativity, and fertility,” Grace rattled off in a small voice.  “We learned about them in school.”

   Mel’s smiled widened.  “Very good.  I can see you are an intelligent child as well as a brave one.”

   Grace’s eyes shifted slightly to the right until they rested on Belle and Jefferson. 

   “Hi, Belle,” she said weakly.  “Is my dad ok?”

   “He’s fine, sweetheart,” Belle assured her.  “You just gave him a good scare, that’s all.  He’s a little overwhelmed just now.”

   Indeed, Jefferson looked as if not for Belle’s support he’d collapse.

   “For god’s sake, man, sit down before you fall down,” Rumple ordered.  He could well remember how frightening it had been whenever Bae had been sick or injured.  “You’re of no use to anyone if you pass out.”

   Belle helped Jefferson sit on the floor next to the bed.  He immediately took Grace’s hand.

   “You’re holding on too tight,” Grace told him.

   “I’m sorry,” the man said, easing his grip.  “How’s that?”

   “Better.  Dad, my other arm hurts really bad.”  She grimaced.

   A moment later, Agrippa strode into the room.  She eyed Rumple.  “Oh, it’s not you again, is it?”

  “No, it’s not.”  Rumple pointed at the child.  “It’s Grace.”

   Melanippe shifted back so the Healer could get closer to the patient. 

   “The injury on her head looks to be just a scratch.  It bled a great deal, but I’ve cleaned it,” Mel explained softly.  “Some of her ribs may be broken.  I think her left shoulder is dislocated.”

   In her efficient way Agrippa examined her patient.  Rumple couldn’t help but notice she was far gentler with Grace than she’d ever been with him.

   “The shoulder is definitely dislocated.  The ribs may be cracked; they may just be bruised.  We’ll bind them just to be sure.  She’s young; she’ll heal fast.” 

   Agrippa gazed down at the little girl.  “Well now, Grace, is it?  How old are you?”

   “Twelve.  Almost thirteen.”

   “You’re old enough to hear the truth, then.  We need to set your shoulder.  I won’t lie to you.  It’s going to hurt.  Understood?”

   “You need to be brave for just a little while longer,” Melanippe encouraged.  “Can you do that?”

   Grace swallowed nervously.  She nodded.  “I guess so.”

   “We’ll all be right here with you,” Belle encouraged.

   “And your father…?”  Melanippe glanced over at the Hatter.

   “Jefferson.  My name is Jefferson.”  A bit of color had returned to his face.

   “Jefferson may continue to hold your hand if you’d like,” the commander offered.  “Is that not so, Agrippa?”

   The old healer rolled her eyes. 

   “If he must,” she grunted.

  

 

 


	4. Ch 4

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The final chapter of The Autumn Bride. The wedding arrives, but not without complications.

Ch. 4

 

   “Look at them,” Rumplestiltskin said to his fiancée as they shared a morning repast of bread and apples.  “They look like ducklings.”

   Belle followed his line of sight and laughed softly.  “I suppose they do, yes.”

   Like any other young girl her age Grace had refused to stay in bed once her shoulder had been reset and her ribs bound up.  Against the pleas of her father she insisted on being up and around within a few hours. 

   With one arm in a sling there wasn’t much Grace could do.  But she seemed to find the Amazons in general, and Melanippe in particular, fascinating.  For the past two days she had trailed the commander nearly everywhere she went.

   And Jefferson, being his usual, anxious self, wouldn’t let Grace out of his sight.  Which meant Mel now had two followers trailing after her most of the time.

   Even now, as Mel crossed the village square deep in conversation with one of her officers, Grace was right behind her listening to every word.  And, behind Grace, was Jefferson, his arms folded behind his back, the skirt of his shabby frock coat swinging as he walked.

    Ducklings, indeed.

   “I’m surprised your aunt puts up with it,” Rumple observed.  “I wouldn’t.”

   “I actually think she’d grown rather fond of Grace,” Belle countered.  “I know you’ve only seen the military side of her, but Mel is actually very kind and gentle with young people.  Even Hecate, and I know for a fact she drove everyone crazy when she first joined up.”  She sighed.  “It’s too bad Mel never had children of her own.  I mean, she can’t marry, of course, because Amazons don’t do that.  But baby Amazons do have to come from somewhere, and Mel is still young enough.”  Belle’s smile was a bit sad.  “She hasn’t come out and said it, but I think Penthesilea has forbidden it.”

   “Maybe the Queen thinks any child Mel has would be a threat to her throne.”

   “Maybe.”   

   Rumple smiled at her.  “Maybe she thinks you are, too, Lady Belle,” he teased.

   Belle chuckled.  “No, I think I’m definitely out of that line of succession, and a good thing, too.  I’m not cut out to be an Amazon.”

   “But look at how well you’ve done here,” he countered.  “I doubt Penthesilea herself could have done much better.”

   “Thank you.”  Belle took his hand in her own.

   He meant what he said.  The little, nameless village was still badly damaged, and it was still currently occupied by part of the Scythian army.  Many of the Amazons had been dispatched with their wounded to begin the journey back to their homeland.  Fewer than three dozen remained. 

   But the soldiers who had stayed were helping repair the damaged buildings and sharing their food stores with the local peasants.  Belle was too generous to say so, but Rumple knew a lot of that was because of her.  Belle had helped make sure everyone had a roof over their heads at night and something to fill their bellies during the day. 

   “Flattery will not get you out of work,” Belle now teased back.  “We’d best get to it.”

   “Yes, my dear,” he said with a mock sigh.

   They spent the morning trying to put the chapel back in order.  The blacksmith had repaired the hinges on the door.  Thankfully the altar with the statues of the God and the Goddess had not been damaged. 

   Rumple was able to use magic to animate a broom and speed things along, but he’d never found magic to be a real substitute for a good cleaning.  It still took several hours of scrubbing and sweeping until the place looked fit again.  But by noon they were both able to rest on a pew and admire their work in quiet satisfaction.

   “Hello there!”  A voice called from outside.  “Anybody home?”

   Belle rubbed some dirt from her cheek as the doors swung open.

   Neal was standing there.  He looked tired and grimy, but he was smiling.

   “Neal, thank goodness!  We’ve been so worried!”  Belle told him.

   Rumple reached his son almost as quickly as Belle did.  He grabbed his shoulder.  “Are you hurt?”  He demanded.

   “Nope.  Well, nothing a good meal and a bath won’t fix.”

   Rumple stared hard at him.  “Truly?”

   “Truly.  I’m fine.”

   Swallowing hard, Rumple turned away for a moment so no one would see the tears of relief that had sprung up in his eyes.  When he had his emotions under control he turned back to Neal and smiled.

   “We brought back a more of the townsfolk we found wandering in the woods,” Neal explained as the trio left the chapel and emerged into the sunlight.  “I hope that won’t be too big a problem,” he added as he surveyed the tents currently housing many of the displaced.

   “Not at all,” Belle reassured him.  “Our food stores are holding out, and the weather’s been mild enough folks can sleep in bed rolls if they don’t want to share a tent or a room with any of their neighbors.”

   “Good.”  He led them over to a small group of men standing in a knot.  “Robin’s on his way to meet with Charming, but I want you to meet some of the Merry Men.” 

   He pointed to a large man, well over six feet tall with a round belly and shoulders like hams.  “This is Little John.  Little John, this is my father, and my stepmother-to-be, Belle.”

   “Pleased to meet you at last,” the big man said jovially.

   “That’s Alan-a Dale,” Neal pointed to a young man with red hair, “and here is Much the Miller’s Son.”

   “You’re all very welcome here,” Belle told them.  “I do apologize for our appearance, but Rumple and I have spent the morning putting the chapel back in order.”

   “Did you?”  A fourth man asked.  “How very kind!”

   “And this is Brother Rook.  Not a Merry Man, I’m afraid, but a very handy fellow anyway,” Little John explained. 

   “He was with some of the locals in the forests,” Neal added.

   “This village was never able to afford to keep a cleric full-time, but I held services here every other month if the roads were dry,” the man explained.  “When I heard it was under attack I helped evacuate as many folks as I could…”  He looked around him at the damage.  “We must count our blessings so many buildings still stand and so many folk have come back safely.”

   “We should, indeed,” Rumple agreed absently, still carefully studying Neal for any signs of illness or injury. 

   “Neal, you should take your friends and go and see Melanippe,” Belle continued.  “She’ll probably be in the old guild hall.  And if you can’t find her just look for Grace and Jefferson.  I don’t think there’ll be any issues but…”

   “…with Amazons better safe than sorry. I know.”  Neal turned to John.  “Why don’t you all go on ahead; I’ll be there in a moment.”

 “Will do.  It was very nice to meet both of you,” Little John repeated before he and the other three departed.

   Rumple watched them go and then turned to find his son regarding him skeptically.

   “What is it?”  He asked.

   “Rook’s a cleric, Papa,” Neal told him.

   “Yes, I heard him.  And?”

   Belle suddenly squeezed Rumple’s arm.  “Oh!”

   Feeling a bit irritated, the sorcerer looked from Belle to Neal and back again.  “What?”

   “He’s a _cleric_ , Rumple!  That means he can marry us!”  Belled said excitedly.

   Rumple felt very foolish.  For more than a month now he and Belle had been waiting to find someone who could perform their ceremony.  And now that someone had appeared and he’d not even made the connection.  He shook his head.  Perhaps losing his magic had dulled his brain as well?

   “Do you think he’d do it?”  Belle asked Neal.

   “Well, you did whip his chapel back into shape before you even knew he was coming,” Neal said reasonably.  “And he does sort of owe the Merry Men and me for finding him out there…”

   Belle smiled her brilliant smile.  “Will you ask him?”

   “Of course.  I’ll do it right now.”

   “Neal, wait.”  Rumple took a deep breath.  “What if he refuses?  After all, I am who I am.  Or rather, who I was…”

   The clerics of the Enchanted Forest had hated and feared the Dark One.  They had never been able to lay a hand on him, of course.  But would that hatred extend to Rumplestiltskin even now that he was human again?

   “I know you never cared for clerics, Papa.  Frankly neither did I.  But I’ve been traveling with Rook for a couple of days now.  He’s a reasonable man.  Let me talk to him, ok?”

   Reluctantly Rumple nodded.  He glanced over at Belle.  She looked so excited—he wouldn’t be able to bear seeing her hopes dashed yet again if the cleric refused.

* * *

 

   Bell only picked at her lunch.

   “Belle, sweetheart, please don’t get your hopes up too high,”  he urged, pushing away his own bowl.

   “I’m not,” she told him.  “I’m just hopeful.  And it’s good to have something to be hopeful about again, don’t you think?”

   “You know, if I had my magic back, all of my magic, this would be the simplest thing in the world,” Rumple grumbled.

   “What, you’d force him to marry us?”  Belle looked appalled.  “Then it wouldn’t be legal!”

   “It would be legal-ish.”

   “Oh, no you don’t, Rumplestiltskin!  I’ve waited for you long enough,” Belle said firmly.  “Even if you were still the Dark One himself I’d expect a proper, legal ceremony, not one performed by someone terrified that any second you’re going to turn him into a slug.”

   “I do miss those days.”  He waggled his fingers in the air experimentally.  “I think I may have just enough magic by now for that…”

   “You’re not funny.”

   “Oh, I’m a little bit funny, dearie.”

   Belle stuck out her tongue at him.  The sight of her pretty pink tongue send a jolt to his heart and points south, reminding him that there was another very good reason to make this woman his sooner rather than later.

   “You’re not even married yet and she’s already making faces at you,” Neal observed as he joined them at the little table outside their tent.  “That’s not a good sign.”

   Rumple looked pointedly at his son.  “Well?”  He demanded.

   “Well, I have good news, and I have bad news.”  Neal sat back in his chair.  “Which do you want first?”

   “Good news,” Belle demanded before Rumple could speak.

   “He said yes.”

   Belle cried out with joy and threw her arms around her future stepson.

   “Aren’t you hugging the wrong person?”  Rumple protested.

   She laughed and hugged him, too.  “Jealous?” she asked.

   “Always.”

   When Belle had sat back down she smiled at Neal.  “He’s fine with it?”

   “Yep.”

   The sorcerer cleared his throat.  “And you, ah, told him about me?  Who I am?”

   “Yes.”  Neal regarded him steadily.  “He knows what he needs to know.  More importantly, I was able to tell him about who you are _now_.”

    Rumple bowed his head in gratitude.  “Thank you, son.”

   He felt, rather than saw, Neal’s grin.  “Any time, Papa.”

   “So, wait.  If that’s not it, what’s the bad news, then?”  Belle finally asked.

   Swiping a bit of cheese from Belle’s plate Neal popped it into his mouth.  “He wants to ride out and check on the neighboring villages that he also serves.  See how they came through, if they need help.  The Merry Men have agreed to go with him in case he needs some muscle.  Which means you need to get married tomorrow, or you’ll have to wait until he gets back.  If he gets back.”

   Belle blinked.  “Tomorrow?”

   Rumple grabbed her hand and squeezed it. 

   “Tomorrow will be just fine,” he vowed.

* * *

 

   That evening he and Belle parted company just after supper.  Even in this world it was customary for the groom not to see his bride before the wedding.  They might not have a gown, or flowers, or musicians, but they mutually decided they could at least observe this tradition. 

   Belle would spend the night with Melanippe in her tent.  Rumple would not see her again until they met in the chapel to walk up the aisle together.

   Just thinking about it made Rumple a little dizzy.

   He wasn’t able to find any soap in the village.  But he’d found a clean towel, so he vigorously scrubbed himself down with cold water in the privacy of his tent until his skin turned pink.  He rinsed his hair again and again until he was sure every trace of dirt and ash was gone.  It wasn’t a leisurely soak in a tub, but he was determined to greet his bride looking his best. 

  As he did so he reflected that he was actually going to be worse dressed at his second wedding than he’d been at his first.  Then he’d had clothes of homespun, but he’d made them himself so the fabric was smooth and well-made.  He’d had a creek to bathe in to get clean. 

   Of course back then he’d been preparing to marry a woman he barely knew.  He’d been so terrified at the prospect of the wedding,  and of the wedding night, that he’d vomited up everything he’d tried to eat or drink that day.

   If he’d known then what he knew now…

   No, he could never regret marrying Milah.  He’d always regret how things had ended, but Milah had given him Bae.  And Bae had been worth everything.

   Rumple next carefully washed his clothes and hung them up to air dry.  In their place he donned an ill-fitting tunic and breeches he’d borrowed from Alan-a-Dale.  He was just glad he wouldn’t have to spend the whole evening standing around naked in the late October air as he waited for his clothes to dry.

   “Can I come in?”  He heard Neal’s voice ask.

   “Of course.”  

   Neal was carrying a small keg on his shoulder.  He hefted it onto the table and grinned at him.  “Looks like you’ve been busy.”

   “I’d give anything for just one of my suits right now,” Rumple admitted.  “But I’m making do.”

   Neal sat down on the edge of the bunk.  “Nervous?”

   Rumple thought about it for a moment.  “No, I’m not.”

   “Not at all?”  Neal asked skeptically.

   “Well, only that Belle will come to her senses and not show up tomorrow.”

   “Belle would never do that, Papa.”

   Rumple smiled.  “No, I know she wouldn’t.  _I_ _’_ _m_ the type to get cold feet, not her.” 

   “Don’t worry.  If for some reason you _do_ get cold feet I’ll make sure you get to that chapel if I have to make you do it at sword point.”

   “You won’t have to do that.”  He regarded his son seriously.  “But thank you.”

   “You know, on the trip back from Neverland I got to thinking about what we’d do for your bachelor party,” Neal added.

   “Oh, yes?  And what did you decide?”

   “Well, at first I thought strippers, of course.” 

   Neal laughed at Rumple’s horrified expression. 

   “But then I remembered that Storybrooke doesn’t have any strippers.  Ruby doesn’t really count.  So then I thought we’d do something more dignified.”

   Rumple was almost afraid to ask.  “Such as?”

   “I was thinking cigars and single-malt Scotch over at the Rabbit Hole.  You, me, David, Archie, Leroy, maybe a couple of others…”

   Rumple paused to hang up his wet towel.

   “That would have been very nice, Neal.  Thank you for thinking of it.”

   “Yeah, well, unfortunately there’s no single-malt Scotch in this world.  But,” Neal indicated the keg, “there is hard cider.”

   “Where did you...?”

   “The man who owns the tavern heard you were getting married tomorrow and thought you might need it.  Little John sampled it and said it was very good.”

   Rumple shook his head, his wet hair shaking off drops of water like a dog.   “I know everyone here in the Forest has their own cider recipe,” he admitted.  “But I seem to recall that stuff can be dangerous.”

   Neal grinned again, producing two tin cups.  “Only one way to find out.  What do you say?”

   After thinking about it for a moment, Rumple pulled up a chair.  “Go on, then.  I don’t suppose one cup will hurt.”

   “Good.”  Neal filled both cups up to the brim.  He held up his.  “To Belle.”

   Rumple smiled, holding up his own.  “To Belle.”

   “And to absent friends,” Neal added.

   Rumple was abruptly reminded again just who Neal was currently missing from his life.

   “And to absent family,” he added softly.  “May we see them again very soon.”

   Neal sighed. 

   “I’ll drink to that.”

* * *

 

   “I told you that stuff was dangerous,” Rumple growled to his son the next morning as they arrived at the chapel.

   “Shhhh,” Neal told him, holding a finger up to his own lips.  “Not so loud, ok?”

   “You’re hung over.”

   “So are you.”

   “I am not,” Rumple protested. 

   “Then why are you squinting like that?  It’s not that sunny out here.”

   “It’s sunny enough,” the older man complained.  He sighed with relief when they stepped into the cool darkness of the chapel.  “Oh, that’s much better,” he sighed.

   Neal snickered.  Rumple shot him a deadly look.

   Rook was already there.  He was dressed in the everyday brown robes of his order.

   “Ah, good, you’re here.  I’m sorry I don’t have a proper set of white robes to marry you in, but we must make do.  Now, you understand how this works?  You wait here at the end of the aisle for your bride.  After everyone is seated she will arrive, and you will walk down the aisle together and take your vows before the God and Goddess.  Then I’ll bind your hands, and you’ll be married.  Any questions?”

   Rumple shook his head, and the cleric moved to the altar.

   “You look like you’re now intimately acquainted with some of our good tavern keeper’s cider,” Little John said as he approached them.

   “No thanks to you,” Rumple told him.

   “I?  I will have you know I imbibed more than I gave you all by myself, and as you can see I’m not suffering in the least,” the big man said.

   “Only because you weigh more than Neal and his father put together,” Much told him.  “Sorry, Neal.”

   “S’OK,” Neal told him.  “We had a blast.  At least, I think we did.”

   The three Merry Men found a seat in one of the pews.

   Rumple rubbed his forehead.  “Why are they here?”

   “Witnesses, Papa.  Rook said we needed them.”

   “Yes, of course.”

   Grace Hatter was the next to arrive, her father, as always, on her heels. 

   “Hello, Rumplestiltskin, hello, Neal.  Listen, I know back home we would have gotten you a toaster oven or something you could use,” she told Rumple apologetically.  “Since we can’t do that here Dad and I picked these this morning for Belle.”  She held up a bouquet of wildflowers in her free arm. 

   “That was very thoughtful of you, Grace.  I’ll make sure she gets them,” Rumple promised. 

   “Congratulations, Rumplestiltskin,” Jefferson told him.  “To you and to Belle.”

   Rumple nodded politely.  He was trying hard not to look too closely at Jefferson’s latest frock coat.  This one was even more obnoxious than the last one, and the paisley pattern was making him a bit nauseous.

   “Let’s go find a place to sit, Dad.  We’ll save a place for Melanippe when she comes.”  Grace seized her father’s sleeve and led him down the aisle.

   To Rumple’s surprise Melanippe was indeed the next to arrive.

   “I thought Amazons don’t believe in marriage,” he blurted out before he could stop himself. 

   “We don’t,” she said coolly.  “But we do believe in family.  That is why I am the only one here.”

   “Belle will be glad.”

   “I would assume so, since she’d right behind me.”  Mel regarded Neal with arched brows.  “I think perhaps Neal should sit down before he falls down.”

   “That’s probably a good idea.  Neal, go sit down.”  Rumple nudged him.

  After Neal and Mel sat down next to the Hatter and his daughter, Rumple was left alone at the top of the aisle.

   He shifted nervously from one foot to the other.  He’d left his walking stick in the tent, determined to marry Belle on his own two feet.  He knew his clothes were clean and his hair was combed, but he still wished he had something grander to wear. 

   She’s loved him as the Dark One, and she’d loved him as Mr. Gold the irascible pawnshop owner.  But now that he was just Rumplestilskin again, in a plain tunic and breeches, would Belle find him wanting? 

   The thought made his head ache.

   “Hello, Rumple.”

   Her voice behind him was as cool and refreshing as water in the desert.

   He turned to look at her, and the pounding in his head ceased abruptly as he got his first look at his bride. 

   Belle was a vision in white.  She wore a dress of simple white fabric with a scooped neckline, bell sleeves, and a full skirt.  Her hair has been brushed until it shone and was drawn over one shoulder in a long braid.  A wide, ornate leather belt showed off her tiny waist.

   “Belle, you look…beautiful,” he breathed.

   “You have to say that,” she smiled shyly.  “All brides are supposed to be beautiful.”

   “No bride in the world could be more beautiful than you,” he said truthfully. 

   He bowed slightly and handed her the bouquet.

   She dipped into a courtesy and accepted it.

  “Of course, I would have happily married you in that leather jerkin you’ve been wearing lately," he added.  "But where in the world did you find a dress?” 

   “The baker’s wife.  She heard we were getting married today so she’s loaning me hers.  It’s a bit big in the waist…”

   “It’s perfect.”

   Bell looked down at herself and laughed.  “The belt came from Melanippe.  She carved all the flowers and figures into the leather herself.”

   “And the dagger?”  He had to ask.  For there was indeed a dagger tucked into the left side of the belt.

   “Also from Mel.  She says it’s been in our family for generations, passed down from mother to daughter.” 

   Belle’s smile was radiant.  “It reminds me a bit of that rhyme they used to say about brides in the other world.”

   “What rhyme was that, darling?”  Rumple wasn’t even going to try and get his brain working just now.

   “’Something old, something new, something borrowed, and something blue,’” she recited.  “It was supposed to be good luck.  So, in this case the dagger is old, and the belt is new.  The dress is certainly borrowed…and I guess the blue can be my eyes.”

   Rumple reached into his pocket.  “Or this.”

   Between them dangled a blue hair ribbon.

   “It looks just like the one I used to wear!”  Belle’s eyes widened.  “Where did you…?”

   Rumple smiled. 

   “Robin Hood.  As soon as we got engaged I asked him to see if he could find one for you.  He does get around, after all, and I told him if he’d do so I’d be in his debt.  But he insisted on tracking one down without any further obligation on my part.”

   “Why, Robin Hood’s a secret romantic!”  Belle laughed.  “Who would have guessed?”

   “I’d sort of given up on it until Neal gave me it to me yesterday,” Rumple said with an apologetic shrug.  “But now I see your dress I’m not sure…”

   “It’s absolutely perfect, Rumple.  Just what this outfit needs.”  She leaned towards him.  “Tie it on for me?”

   Carefully he wrapped the blue ribbon around the end of Belle’s braid.  He was certain the bow he made was lop-sided. 

   But when Belle looked down at it she pronounced it perfect.

   He cleared his throat.

   “I do love you, Belle.  So very, very much.”

   “And I love you, Rumplestiltskin.”

   He held out his arm.

   “Shall we?”  He asked.

  Belle smiled her beautiful smile, and put her hand on his arm so he could lead her to the altar.

   “We shall.”

   And so they did.

* * *

  
_The Present_

   “And so we did.”

   It was evening now, and Rumple had been telling the story in fits and starts for the last few hours.  He’d edited much of it, of course: there were bits his daughter just didn’t need to hear.  But he felt like he’d captured the truth of it.

   “Hmmm,” Helena now said as she stirred her stew with a spoon.

   “’Hmmm,’ what, dearie?”  He asked.

   Mrs. Spratt approached their table with a pitcher, and he waved her away.

   “You’re the one who wanted to hear the story,” he reminded his second born.

   “No, Dad, it was a great story, really, it was.  I just can’t believe I’ve never heard most of it before.”

   She grinned crookedly.  “I especially liked the part when Neal said that if you chickened out he’d march you to the chapel and get you married at sword point.”

  Rumple relaxed a bit.

   “And he would have, too. I’ve no doubt.”  He took a bite of his own stew.  “Of course, your mother and I didn’t have to marry at sword point.  We left that to your Aunt Mel and Uncle Jefferson.”

   Unfortunately he said this just as Helena had taken a sip of milk.  She spluttered in surprise and had to wipe her chin with her hand.

   “What?!”

   Rumple handed her a napkin.

   “There’s no need to get so excited, Helena,” he scolded gently.  “It wasn’t that big of a deal, even if Mel was technically supposed to be marrying someone else.”

   “What do you mean, Mel and Jefferson got married at sword point?”  Her blue eyes narrowed.  “And what do you mean, she was supposed to marry someone else?  Who?”

   “Oh, my dear, I’m afraid…”

   “It’s another long story, isn’t it?”

   “Yes, dearie, it is.”

   Helena leaned back in her seat.

   “Ok, then, Dad.  Spill.”

   Rumple sighed and pushed away his supper.  “All right.  But don’t say I didn’t warn you.”

   He smiled.

   “Once upon a time…” 

  

 

   

 

 

 

  

 

  

  

   

 


End file.
